Trauma centre fire: After eight deaths, KGMU says five but not due to blaze

Talking to media persons, the KGMU medical superintendent Prof Vijay Kumar said two children died before the fire broke out and three others, who were shifted to other wards, died during treatment.

A day after a massive fire broke out at the trauma centre of the King George’s Medical University (KGMU) in Lucknow, the university administration admitted to five deaths but “not due to the blaze.”

As many as eight deaths have been reported within 24 hours of fire incident.(Dheeraj Dhawan/HT Photo)

The authorities said the deaths occurred as the patients were in a serious condition.

Talking to media persons, the KGMU medical superintendent Prof Vijay Kumar said two children died before the fire broke out and three others, who were shifted to other wards, died during treatment.

Addressing a hurriedly called press conference, KGMU vice-chancellor Prof MLB Bhatt said doctors and medical staff were quick to respond to the tragedy and their decision to transfer patients was right.

Prof Bhatt claimed that KGMU doctors and staff worked swiftly and dedicatedly to rescue the patients. He, however, avoided questions from newspersons and left the conference hall saying he had to go for selection committee interviews.

As many as eight deaths have been reported within 24 hours of fire incident.

The probe committee comprising district administration officials said two patients died during shifting. It said accountability would be fixed after the probe report is submitted.

The inquiry committee, that will submit its report by Wednesday, comprises district magistrate Kaushal Raj Sharma, SSP Deepak Kumar, electrical safety officer and chief fire officer of the fire department.

Services have been partially restored at the trauma centre. New admissions are being allowed but the operation theatres are yet to be started. “We are putting things in order but it will take some time,” the medical superintendent said on Monday.

The DM said the fire broke out due to overheating of some electrical equipment in the store.

Ram Pyeri of Hardoi died at 7.30 pm on Saturday due to cardiac arrest while two other children died at around 6.45 pm before the fire broke out at 7 pm. One of them is from Lalitpur district while details of the other child are not available.

Two patients – Sadhu Singh Rastogi, 44, of Lakhimpur Kheri and Hemant Kumar, 38, of Lucknow, died during the course of shifting from the Trauma Centre. Three other deaths reportedly have nothing to do with the fire incident.

It seems no lessons have been learnt from the past incidents as this is not the first time that alarms remained silent in case of a fire.

Two months ago, a short circuit in one of the sleep labs in the department of physiology caused a major fire resulting in loss of property but water sprinklers did not work.

Even after the incident, no effort was made to check the fire alarms and water sprinklers.